Sweetwater County Looking For Family Of Man Who Was Found In Flaming Gorge

The Sweetwater County Sheriff's Department is searching for the family of a man who went missing and died in the Flaming Gorge Reservoir earlier this year.

EF
Ellen Fike

November 20, 20202 min read

Gorge photo

The Sweetwater County Sheriff’s Department is searching for the family of a man who went missing and died in the Flaming Gorge Reservoir earlier this year.

On Sunday, deputies were called to the Anvil Draw camping area of the reservoir after someone discovered a man dead in his camper. The man was later identified as 79-year-old Ronnie Baze Sumner, who had apparently died at the site months previously.

Sumner’s death didn’t appear to be suspicious.

But over the course of the investigation, deputies determined that the elderly man lived a fairly solitary and reclusive lifestyle, making it difficult to identify any next of kin.

Sumner was born in Las Vegas, but has lived in Casper, Manila and Green River, Utah over the course of his life.

Anyone with information about Sumner’s family should contact the Sweetwater County Sheriff’s Department.

This isn’t the first death to occur at Flaming Gorge this year.

In August, a man and his son were seen leaving their camp site in the middle of the night in an all-terrain vehicle. An eyewitness later reported that the pair never returned to camp in the side-by-side.

The boy’s body was found in the reservoir a few days later.

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Ellen Fike

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